Lady of the Manners

The Lady of the Manners makes no claims of having always been Gothic; the Lady of the Manners firmly believes that no one can really claim that, and anyone who does might be trying a touch too hard to establish their gothy credibility.

However, the Lady of the Manners was a fairly spooky & morbid child, with parents who never objected to the Lady of the Manners’ eccentric taste in clothing. (Instead, the Lady of the Manners’ parents used it as an incentive to do well in school: “If you get straight A’s, we’ll buy you pointy buckle boots!”) The Lady of the Manners’ father raised her to be his revenge upon the universe, while her mother rolled her eyes a lot and frequently had an air of amused patience.

When the Lady of the Manners discovered the existence of the whole Gothic subculture, she clapped her hands with glee and fell upon it like a babybat upon a box of Count Chocula cereal. Eventually the Lady of the Manners came to realize that excellent clothes were not, contrary to popular opinion, a substitute for excellent manners, and that being a Black-Clad-Freak didn’t have to mean being depressed and snarly. (Witty, sarcastic, and possibly a touch cynical, yes. Mean-spirited, sullen, and rude, no.) Since then, the Lady of the Manners has spent a not-inconsiderable amount of time trying to gently persuade others in her chosen subculture that being a goth and being polite is much, much more subversive than just wearing black t-shirts with ‘edgy’ sayings on them.